The present invention concerns a device for collecting and transporting groups of partly superimposed postal objects.
Postal sorting systems are known comprising devices for automatically reading an input stream of flat and substantially rectangular postal objects (letters, cards, documents in envelopes, folded newspapers etc), which automatically read the address associated with that postal object. The automatic reading devices are also able to remove those postal objects for which it is not possible automatically to identify the address and send them to a collection device in which the postal objects are stored until the address can be manually identified. The known collection devices usually store the postal objects waiting for identification in containers in which the postal objects are deposited in succession. These devices are not very flexible in use, as they sometimes require manual operations to function (such as, for example, transport of and/or emptying the containers) and are therefore inefficient.
Stream forming devices also exist that receive postal objects as input, for example, in the form of packages, and generate as output a group of partially superimposed postal objects (FIG. 2), that is, aligned in a rectilinear direction, partly superimposed and arranged with their front edges (corresponding to the smaller side of the perimeter of the rectangle) suitably spaced from each other, for example, by a substantially constant spacing S.
The object of the present invention is to produce a collection device that performs the function of accumulating and transporting groups of partly superimposed postal objects in a completely automatic manner.
The aforesaid object is achieved by the present invention in that it concerns a collection and transport device for groups of partly superimposed postal objects of the type defined in claim 1.